


i loved you in pink, and i love you in yellow

by mars22



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/M, also don't let the ~aesthetic~ fool you, but i don't think i pulled it off very well, i love the premise of this, it's more like mid canon, so please bear w me, this has proper grammar, well kinda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-06-22
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:33:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24854659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mars22/pseuds/mars22
Summary: mike has always loved el, it seems. he just can never seem to get the words to spill out of his mouth.
Relationships: Eleven | Jane Hopper/Mike Wheeler
Comments: 11
Kudos: 31





	i loved you in pink, and i love you in yellow

**Author's Note:**

> idk but i feel like i should put a disclaimer here: i do call el "eleven" in this fic, but i'm also writing inside of season one mike's head. that's what he typically calls her in that season. i kinda really hate calling her that, but i'm just trying to be accurate. i would usually try and stick to "el".

"I'm just trying to demonstrate how careless Max is with Eleven's powers," Mike said loudly. He was seriously getting frustrated with the lack of care the others showed towards her, acting like she was some kind of invincible superhero, with no limit to what she could do. But Mike, of all people, knew that wasn't true. He had seen firsthand the effects overusing her powers had on her, and had also lived through the pain of losing her. He wasn't going to chance that again, even if it went against the (very wrong) opinions of Max. And, in fact, all of them. 

"In fact, how careless all of you are!" Mike vocalised his thoughts. "You're treating her like some kind of machine when she's not a machine, and I don't want her to die looking for the flayed when they've obviously vanished off the face of the Earth!" Nancy opened her mouth like she wanted to speak, but Mike pressed on and gave her no opportunity. "So can we please just come up with a new plan because I love her and I can't lose her again!" 

Okay, he hadn't meant to say _that _.__

____

Of course, he had thought it, many times actually. He had even come close to telling her, psyching himself out just before he got the courage up every time. And it hadn't gotten easier the last few days, what with Hopper breaking them up and Max doing everything in her power to keep them apart, especially considering Mike had most wanted to tell her in the past week when the thought of losing her again loomed large in his brain. But now, now it was out to nearly everyone except El, which sucked. Plus, Nancy was, like, two feet from him. 

__

_Nancy._

_____ _

Mike glanced up at her anxiously, and she was looking at him too, mouth slightly open, with an almost saddened look on her face. He glanced over at Lucas, too, the one who made fun of him the most when it came to El, but he was just grinning, like he had known all along. 

_____ _

(He kind of had, to be honest. Lucas was the first to verbalize Mike's feelings for El, even if he had just been making stupid jokes at the time.) 

_____ _

Mike turned from Lucas and towards the floor again, refusing to make eye contact with anybody, when the door to El's bedroom creaked. Everyone simultaneously turned towards her, as she stepped out and, for a split second, looked right at Mike. 

_____ _

And, technically, yes, Mike was aware that El was wearing this bright yellow shirt and black pants with suspenders, and was very much older, but Mike couldn't see yellow at all. 

_____ _

Instead, all he saw was pink. 

_____ _

____

_____ _

  
\---

_____ _

___  
_   
_   
_

"So, do you think she's ever eaten a slice of pizza before?" 

_____ _

"You're such an idiot." 

_____ _

"I'm just saying! I don't think I would've survived this long without pizza if I were her." 

_____ _

"But you wouldn't know what you were missing out on if you never knew it existed and were stuck in a lab for twelve years!" 

_____ _

Mike listened to Lucas and Dustin bicker about everything and nothing (per usual) as they waited for Eleven to finish changing. They had done her makeup and given her socks and shoes, and Mike had put on his grandmother's blonde wig for her. Now they waited for her to slip into Nancy's old dress so they could head to school (which they were already late for). 

_____ _

As Mike was opening his mouth to tell them to shut it, the door creaked and, before anyone had time to say anything, it swung open. 

_____ _

Mike didn’t think he’d ever live to see an angel, and yet there she was: the sunlight that leaked in from the bathroom window bounced off her hair and created a halo that made her head look like the sun. The hallway light glinted off her rapidly fading lip gloss, and her dress hung off her body like it was tailored to her, and not some leftover of a Halloween long past when Nancy went as Sleeping Beauty. 

_____ _

"Wow," Dustin spoke, interrupting Mike's thoughts. "She looks --" 

_____ _

"Pretty," the word was out of his mouth before he could really stop it. El's face morphed into something of shock, and he could feel Lucas and Dustin's eyes burning holes in the back of his head, and his cheeks went hot and (he assumed) bright red, so he quickly covered. 

_____ _

"Good, I mean," he said anxiously. "You look pretty good." 

_____ _

But it was too late. The words were out there, in the world, for Dustin and Lucas to tease him about the second El left the room, for El to ponder over and wonder what he meant (pretty like Nancy or pretty good like everything else?), for Mike to regret ever saying (in front of his friends, to be clear. In the years to come, especially the next one, he would always regret not saying everything he ever could to El, as it would now be impossible for him to do so). But none of those facts could ever change this one: Mike was now, officially, in love with El. 

_____ _

And maybe he didn't quite know it yet. Maybe it was too impossible or scary for a mere twelve year old to even fathom the idea of being in love with someone, really and truly. But, when he would look back years later, he would pinpoint that moment as the first time his heart would ever stop beating all at once and butterflies would press against his stomach lining and his brain would cease to think. This was, in truth, the first time that Mike had ever thought of El as a _girl _. Before, she was a kid like them, a friend to have, to come over and hang out and (per Dustin’s apparent request) eat pizza. But now? Now she was a girl, like Nancy, or Jennifer Hayes. She was a girl, to be considered as a crush or, even…__

_______ _ _ _

(The next time he would feel like that would be a year later, when she would walk through a different doorway, this time with slicked back, greasy hair and the clothing of a criminal, when he would realize he loves her, and then a few more months would pass and El would walk out of yet another doorway, this time with her brown hair hanging loose just above her shoulders and a slightly bloody nose and a blindfold hanging around her neck, right after he would finally admit that he loves her.) 

_______ _ _ _

But he didn't want to think about that. Not yet. Not when Will was missing and he hadn't even seen Nancy in days and there were so many things pressing around his brain, demanding the space. There was no space, no vacancies in his head, for what he felt about El. Not yet. 

_______ _ _ _

But then soon, unbeknownst to him, there would be all too much space for her, and yet she wasn't occupying it anymore. She would be gone, and all he would have left was the foggy, rose coloured memories of her. 

_______ _ _ _

He didn't know that, not yet, anyway. If he had, maybe he would've done things differently. Maybe he would've told her how he felt, nevermind the fact that Lucas and Dustin were behind him and they were already late for school. Maybe he would've. 

_______ _ _ _

But he doesn't. He just follows her to the mirror, where she evaluates herself, and tries to bury his feelings deep down inside. 

_______ _ _ _

________

_____ _

  
\---

_____ _

_____   
_  
  


“What’s going on?” El asked cautiously. It was met with silence. Had she heard? Was Max going to tell her? What was he supposed to say? 

_______ _ _ _

“N-nothing, nothing, I --” 

_______ _ _ _

“Just a family discussion,” Lucas saved him from embarrassing himself further, and he was eternally grateful for it. Max looked back at him and gave him a shocked look, realizing that this was not only the first time he had said -- that -- to his sister and his friends, but El had never heard it, either. All he could do was meet Max's eyes silently before they both turned back to look at El. 

_______ _ _ _

“I found him,” she said quietly and slowly, clearly nervous. 

_______ _ _ _

“Found, who?” Nancy asked her. El bit her lip. 

_______ _ _ _

Mike knew they had bigger things to worry about, he did, he just wished he could go back in time someplace. Maybe to when she dressed up in Nancy's dress, or when she walked through the Byers' door, or the Snowball. In all honesty, he wished he were anywhere but there. Or maybe he wished that he and El were in a place where he could run up to her and kiss her like it was the end of the world (because maybe it was) and he could tell her he loved her and everything could be okay again. He liked to think that, in an alternate dimension, that was happening at that very moment. Somewhere, in the universe, another version of himself was holding another version of El and telling her that he was in love with her. He just had the bad luck of being stuck in the timeline where everything always went wrong for them. 

_______ _ _ _

Mike was going to lose her again after tonight, he was sure of it. After everything, she would no longer be his, and he would have to go back to living off of what she had given him in their short time together. He would be flung straight back to 1984, calling her desperately and trying to understand why everything had happened the way it did.

_______ _ _ _

**Author's Note:**

> this was so all over the place in my doc of it, like i had repeated paragraphs with different phrasing and stuff to try and figure out how which one i liked best, so if anyone sees that please lmk. i skimmed this a few times to make sure, but i'm still not confident that i caught them all :/
> 
> i love the premise of this sm! i don't really think i pulled it off very well, but i still like this and i hope you enjoyed it. you can find me on tumblr under mikewhecler :)


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